The value of the current Google deal with Mozilla is not being disclosed. Whatever the amount is though, it’s safe to say that it represents pocket change to Google, which has $43 billion in cash and short term securities on its balance sheet.

And with Google facing antitrust scrutiny for a variety of business practices, spending a little money to keep a rival browser alive has important PR value.

True, Google doesn’t dominate the Web browser market the way it does the search market. But Chrome’s market share is growing fast (in September 2009, it had a scant 2.8 percent share). And given the importance of the Web browser as the gateway to online information, Google’s newfound status as a browser superpower could provide ammunition to its critics going forward, especially if the browser market were to suddenly consist of only two major players, i.e. Google and Microsoft.

Of course, there’s no guarantee that Firefox would have disappeared had Google not renewed the deal – Microsoft might well have swooped in as Firefox’s new benefactor, becoming the default Firefox search provider in the process.

Still, in some ways Google’s Mozilla deal has echoes of a past move by another tech giant that once faced its own antitrust scrutiny: in 1997 Microsoft invested $150 million in Apple, a move that kept the then-struggling Mac maker alive to see another day and seemed designed to soften the criticisms about Microsoft’s PC market dominance.

A year later though, the U.S. government went on to sue Microsoft for antitrust violations.

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I write about Internet companies including Google, Yahoo and Facebook. I’ve covered technology and business for more than ten years at publications including TheStreet.com, CNET and The Industry Standard magazine.